IN ITALY TODAY
By SIR EVELYN WRENCH
FOR the first time in my life I have left Italian soil with a sigh of relief. Hitherto holidays spent in Italy had always been a joy undiluted. It was four years since my last visit, when the Abyssinian crisis was just beginning, and I wondered what changes I would notice.
With official Italy I had little contact, beyond a rigorous passport inspection and a declaration for the customs' officials of the amount of money in my possession. During a fortnight's visit I sought every opportunity of personal contact with Italians of all classes. I take away with me an overwhelming impression of the friendliness of the Italian people. They went out of their way to express their regard for Great Britain, and their dislike of political conditions which are estranging them from Great Britain and France. They also expressed a cordial dislike of their increasingly close association with Germany.
The other major impression that I carry away is of the bitterness of the Italian Press, acting doubtless under in- structions from the Government. It was a painful experience for a life-long friend of Italy to find anti-British feeling expressed in almost every column dealing with foreign news.
The two chief topics receiving attention were Anglo-Japanese tension in the Far East, and the Anglo-Soviet discussions at Moscow. If a Japanese director of the Italian Press had been in charge he could hardly have written in a strain more favourable to Japan. Headlines, right across the front page, informed the reader of each new humiliation inflicted on Great Britain by Japan, of London's depression, of the new German revelations of the " warlike aims " of the Democracies, or of the " alarm " in London concerning the visit of the Representative of Ibn Saud to Herr Hitler at Berchtesgaden. There were almost daily photographs of Japanese troops in action.
I looked in vain for any attempt to explain fairly to Italian readers the British point of view. There were, of course, extracts from the London newspapers, but the place of honour was usually given to cables from the official Japanese Domei Agency. I was reminded of my stay in Germany, as a boy, during the Boer war. It was difficult to reconcile the treatment meted out to Great Britain in the Press with the signing of the Anglo-Italian Pact fifteen months ago. The visit of Mr. Chamberlain and Lord Halifax to Rome seemed to belong to another age. The travelling Englishman can surely be excused if he thinks that the Policy of Appease- ment has not had much effect on official Italy! The briefest of mentions was given to -the visit of the King and Queen to Canada and the United States. Every expression of opinion by Dr. Goebbels was cabled in full, and current events were recorded from the angle of the German Govern- ment.
If, however, the contact of the British visitor with Italy through its Press was unpleasant, the friendliness of the Italian people stood out all the more. Italians were only too ready to express their admiration for British institutions, to deplore the lack of British visitors and to criticise, the political direction of their own country. It is difficult to know how much importance to attach to these casual dis- cussions ; my wanderings were confined to a tourist region in Northern Italy, where obviously the lamentable state of the tourist industry is keenly felt. In one small town, familiar to British visitors, in mid-June there were three guests in one hotel and one in the other. In another tourist centre a far-famed hostelry, capable of accommo- dating two hundred and fifty people, had but twenty guests, and similar conditions prevailed elsewhere.
A brief summary of a few conversations may be of interest.
A working-man said: " The Italian people have nothing but friendship for Great Britain, nor have they any desire to fight against the French ; they will never fight alongside Germany against their former allies if they can help it. The country is suffering from low wages and the high cost of living ; visits to the big towns give a quite false idea of prosperity ; if one wants to see the economic conditions as they are, one should visit the small towns and the countryside. The only really prosperous businesses are those dependent on the armament industry. The Italian people believe that Germany wants world-domination. It is getting tired of a Dictatorship in which it has no say. The Government makes a great mistake in supposing that the people is ignorant and does not think for itself."
A priest said: " The only hope of the world is Christ and Christ its only salvation ; there calm& be a double allegiance. In a Christian world there is not room for another system which demands the entire allegiance of the individual. If two such systems exist, ultimately there must be a clash of ideals. My countrymen know full well that Great Britain has no desire to harm Italy. The Italian people do not wish to fight Germany's battles."
A village inn-keeper said: "The Press has a great deal to be responsible for, and, alas, many ignorant people are influenced by it here in Italy. If one has travelled and knows other countries at first hand, one realises what a distorted picture of current events is given. I have lived in England for many years and since my return to Italy I sometimes feel as if I could not stand this lack of freedom and must go abroad once more. I try to explain to my friends how misleading our papers are, but one has to be careful."
A shopwoman said: " Nobody wants war, except perhaps four or five of the leaders of the country. Of the two Dictators, Hitler is much the worst, car apres tout Mussolini est un peu senti- mental—". (What she exactly meant by this remark I did not know.) A peasant said: " We ordinary folk do not believe half the things we see in the Press, and we do not wish to join with the Germans in any circumstances. It is terrible to think that Italy is siding with Japan in the present crisis and that very likely before long the nations of Europe will be fighting -among themselves. Before we know where we are, the Yellow Races will be turning on the West."
The Italian people rightly recognise the great debt they owe to their Leader, and that a new Italy has been created where efficiency is the order of the day. They point with pride to the wonderful tasks of reconstruction that have been achieved, road-building, reclamation of waste land, construction of new towns in areas which were formerly fever-ridden swamps, the installation of infant-welfare centres, the organisation of mass physical training, the clear- ance of slums and the initiation of many far-sighted reforms. All that must in justice be given full weight, though it is difficult for a freedom-loving Englishman to appreciate all the good points in a system which forbids the ordinary citizen to think for himself, and exercises a tyranny over the smallest detail in life.
One final impression. Wherever I went I was struck by the number of children to be seen, and I thought regret- fully of the small families in most of the democratic countries. In the last thirty years the population of Italy has increased by nearly ten millions ; if the present rate of progress continues, in a very few years there will be more Italians in Europe than Britons. It is no wonder that the Italian. Government, relying on so much man-power, looks forward to the future with confidence.
One Sunday morning I went to High Mass, oppressed by reading the Italian papers. The Church was full to over- flowing, and the congregation listened with rapt attention to the eloquent sermon, which had for its text the subject of Divine Love. The preacher, aflame with his theme, kept on reiterating that it was the world, the whole world, with- out barriers of nationality, that Christ died for ; that hate achieved nothing, that love alone could do the impossible and unite mankind. As I left Italy I kept pondering on this message of hope. Surely there must be hundreds of thousands of Italians who still give their allegiance to ideals such as these.
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